All Chapters of Alone In A Foreign Land: Chapter 1 - Chapter 10

He looked at me without a trace of concern, only irritation.“Clean this up, and hurry with the food. Everyone’s hungry.”The door shut behind him.What he didn’t know was that there was a seven-week-old child in my womb. What he also didn’t know was that I had just discovered, at the hospital, that my marriage was nothing but a lie—a joke.My life, ever since the moment I fell in love with him, had been one cruel joke.… The next day was the weekend. Early in the morning, Mark left the apartment, saying he had an urgent client to meet. Of course, Tonya went with him.The apartment fell into a dead silence. Then suddenly, my phone screen lit up with a notification. The profile picture looked familiar. It was a candid shot of a man’s back, but I recognized that watch instantly. It was the one Mark always wore.I tapped into the account. There weren’t many posts, but every single one sent a chill straight through me. The earliest post dated back five years, shortly after I had “

After the procedure, a dull ache lingered in my lower abdomen, as if something had been forcibly taken from me. I stood by the side of the street, leaning against a lamppost. It took me ten minutes before I finally managed to get a cab. When I got home, I collapsed onto the bed and drifted into a hazy sleep.In the middle of the night, my phone rang. Mark’s name flashed on the screen.I answered, but it wasn’t him who answered. “Kaia? Mr. Henderson drank too much while attending to a client at dinner tonight. He refuses to leave unless you come pick him up. We’re at a bar. Hurry.”It was Tonya.I glanced at the time. It was two o’clock in the morning. My lower abdomen still ached, and my whole body felt weak. I opened my mouth, but my throat was so dry I couldn’t make a sound.After hanging up, I lay back down. Then, my phone rang again. Even when I declined it, it rang again. On the third call, I forced myself up and got dressed. Every movement pulled at the pain, but I was u

Mark locked himself in his office and dialed my number, but my phone was switched off. So, he sent me a message, but it failed to deliver. Even when he sent an email, there was no response.He slumped back in his chair, closing his eyes. His mind kept replaying the past few years like a movie, scene after scene. He remembered the first time he brought me home to meet his parents. I had been so nervous I could barely speak, yet I still forced myself to serve his mother food at the table.Afterward, his mother had said, “That girl is too forward. She doesn’t seem like she comes from a proper family.”He hadn’t said anything at the time, but he had thought to himself that I was only forward because I had feelings for him, and what was wrong with that?He remembered our first year abroad. Even at the grocery store, I had to take a long time gesturing awkwardly to get my point across. He thought I was embarrassing, so he told me not to go anymore—that I could just order everything onlin

Tonya’s face went pale for a split second, but she quickly recovered.“Of course it’s fake. How could I possibly have married you? Don’t you already have Kaia?”“Then what was the point of posting all that?”Tonya glanced at the screen and smiled. “Mr. Henderson, what did I say exactly? I wrote ‘forever recognized by law,’ but that’s fake. The law doesn’t recognize it, so where was I wrong? And I thanked you in the end. Well, you helped me with my permanent residence. Shouldn’t I thank you?”Mark looked at her, and for the first time, she felt like a stranger to him.For five years, she had worked late with him, attended endless social dinners by his side, and stood with him through one difficult case after another. He had always thought she was his perfect partner, the one who understood him best. Yet now, he realized he had never really understood her at all. Or maybe, he had never even tried because there had only ever been one person in his heart. That person would wake up a

“I was pregnant and too scared to tell you, so I went to the hospital alone for the procedure, only to get a call at two in the morning to pick you up from a bar and almost got attacked in that alley…” My voice broke off, and I didn’t continue.Mark’s eyes were red. “Kaia…”“Mark,” I said, looking at him, my gaze calm and still. “That shadow of yours… It’s gone.”I turned and walked into the studio, closing the glass door quietly behind me. Meanwhile, Mark stood frozen in place, staring at the door for a long, long time. …After that, he didn’t leave. Instead, he checked into a small hotel near Monti, bought a coffee every morning, and sat on the bench across from my studio, watching that glass door.Sometimes, I arrived early, and sometimes I didn’t come until noon. When I came and went, I sometimes noticed him, but my eyes never lingered, as if I were looking at a stranger.Mark didn’t dare approach either because he didn’t know what to say or what he could do. So, he just sa